Little Things
by 1917farmgirl
Summary: Beka learns...


**Author's Notes:** This is a bunny born from the bunnies of another short fic of mine. And, while its parent story "I Never Told Anyone But…" is not set in the universe of my long story, "Waiting for the Light," this one is.  
**Season:** Pre-Drom  
**Disclaimer:** Only one character in this is mine and I'm sure you'll know which…

**Little Things**

"SEAMUS HARPER! WHAT IN THE NAME OF THE VEDRAN EMPRESS _IS_ THIS AND WHY IS IT ON MY SHIP?"

The young blond kid jerked his spiky head up in surprise as a yelling Beka entered the engine room, clutching that _thing_ between her thumb and finger and holding it as far away from her as possible. His eyes grew wide and fearful, and he quickly backed away from what he was doing. Then he saw what she was carrying and those eyes flashed.

"Hey!" he cried, springing forward and grabbing the lumpy mess from her, clutching it to his chest. "That's mine!"

"I _know_ it's yours! Who else would keep something like that? What I'm asking is _what_ is it and _why_ do you have it?"

The boy hesitated. He'd only been on her ship for a month now. She'd cleaned him up, got some decent clothes on him, stuffed a few good meals down his throat…but that didn't mean they knew each other yet. She was the boss, he was the scrawny kid one mouth-off away from the airlock, and for right now, she was content to keep it that way. He had no delusions of his position, either; a position that didn't make him exactly eager to spill his guts to this fiery red-head who was more than a little bit scary.

"I asked you what that lump of trash is…" she stressed, hands on her hips.

His face hardened rather defensively. "It ain't a lump of trash! It's Sylvester!"

One of Beka's eyebrows traveled toward the bulkhead above. "Sylvester?"

The boy sighed and looked down, still holding onto the _thing_ for dear life. Obviously his new boss wasn't satisfied with that answer. "Itsmystuffedcatokay…" he mumbled to his boots.

"What?" Beka asked. "I didn't quite catch that…"

"It's my stuffed cat!" Harper finally spat, embarrassed. "My mom made it for me."

The other eyebrow joined its mate. "That? That's not a stuffed anything! That's a ragged bundle of germs and disease and dirt, and it's polluting my clean ship! I thought I told you to space all that stuff except the rabbit's foot, which I only let you keep with strong protest."

Harper blanched. "But…but…Boss…"

She rode over him, oblivious to his horror. "How'd you get it on here, anyway?"

"Stuffed it in my jacket when I came on," he whispered, his eyes never leaving Beka's face.

Beka rubbed her forehead. She had a massive headache. The shipping deal had fallen through, the slipstream drive was faulty, ready to fail any day and would cost an arm and three legs to fix, and to top it all off, she'd just gotten another letter from Bobby begging her to take him back. She was grumpy and she really didn't want to deal with this right now. "Well, it can go right back off. I'm not having that horrible thing lying around here. Put it in the airlock and as soon as we leave the drift we'll space it."

"Boss!" Harper's face was one of panic. "Can't we…wash him or something? You let me stay after I washed!"

"Harper, you didn't fall apart. I stick that in the washer, not only will it disintegrate, it'll kill the machine. It's going, that's that." She pointed toward the airlock. "If you like it that much, we'll get you a new one on our next shopping trip." She rolled her eyes. Almost twenty years old and crying over a stuffed toy…

For a second he looked ready to fight, or protest, but it quickly died and he returned his eyes to the deck. For just a moment, Beka felt bad for abusing her power over him. She'd seen the way he jumped at loud noises, flinched when touched, kept his eyes lowered, followed orders… She knew he was terrified she'd dump him, or worse, take him back to Earth. It wasn't right to play on those fears…but then she caught a whiff of that disgusting rag-ball again. Her headache returned and her guilt disappeared.

"Now, Harper."

He shuffled past her and disappeared into the airlock.

It was a long time before he came out again, empty-handed. Beka was absorbed in a new message from the drift suggesting that maybe her ship would be required after all, so she only nodded to him. Had she looked closer, she might have noticed that his eyes were red-rimmed and his shoulders slumped.

"Going to bed," he mumbled as he passed her.

"Fine," she replied distractedly.

00000

Beka set the cup of coffee down on the table, a satisfied smile on her face. Apparently, after his _first-rate_ shipper had tried to make off with half his cash, Mr. Kerns had decided their services would be needed after all. It sure was nice to be needed…

With a little laugh, she left the flexi outlining their shipping run on the table top and stood, stretching her back. Now, if only she could get that slipstream drive running long enough to complete the run and get the paycheck, then she could pay to fix it properly.

She wandered into the engine room to take one last look before bed. Not that she thought it would help, but still, who knew when inspiration could strike?

"What the…"

For the first time she noticed the tools that were scattered everywhere, and the fresh welds and wires running into her slip-drive. "That little brat!" she hissed, stepping closer to inspect the damage. "So that's what he was doing in here when I came in with that rag," she seethed. She knew the kid had a knack for machines, but she was not anxious to see how much of a knack by letting him test it on her _Maru_! He'd been given strict orders not to touch one bolt of her ship unless she gave him permission, and yet here he was messing with the most expensive, most dangerous, most important part of it all!

"I'm gonna kill him..." she breathed. "Maybe I'll space him along with that little toy of his! Maybe I'll donate him to the Perseids for science! Maybe I'll…"

Her whispered tirade died off as she looked closer at his work. Soon, she wasn't saying anything; she was just staring in open shock and amazement. Finally, she sat back on her haunches, lost in thought.

He'd fixed it.

It wasn't new, but it would last, probably for more than just one desperate run, too. And what's more, she knew he hadn't left his bunk since coming back from the airlock, so that meant he'd fixed it _before _her little tantrum. And he hadn't said a word about it in his defense, just did what she'd asked him to…

After a long, long time, she stood and quietly made her way to the airlock. It hissed open and she looked down. Leaning against the outside door, propped up so it _might_ have been sitting, was that little, mangy rag-ball of a toy. He'd even covered it, using a rag like a blanket. He'd set it down, and covered it up to keep it _warm,_ and then left it sitting there to be expelled into nothingness because she'd ordered him to do it.

Well, it didn't look like a cat to her, didn't look like much at all, but apparently it meant a lot to Harper. Hadn't he said something about his mom making it, or something?

Beka sighed. He'd never mentioned family before; parents, siblings, etc, and she'd never asked. She'd just assumed he didn't have any and it wasn't really her business. But apparently he must have had one, at some point.

Gingerly, she picked it up and looked at it closer. Yeah, guess that might have been an ear once… And she was pretty sure someone had once sewed eyes on there… It _did_ still have a tail, but most of the fur had been rubbed off… She could, however, tell that it had been mended, many times in small, straight stitches, and then a few more times, in larger, crooked, uneven ones. Mom's and Harper's…it was easy to tell them apart. Apparently, Harper hadn't had anyone around to fix it for him for a while…

She scrubbed her free hand through her hair. _Why me_? she felt like asking. Then she looked at the rag again.

"I suppose, if I let it soak in the sink, rubbed it carefully with a little clothes soap, maybe stitched up that hole back there and then sprayed the whole thing liberally with disinfectant it might not be too bad…" she mumbled to herself. Resigned to a long night, she headed back to the kitchen.

00000

Harper woke to the horrible feeling that something was missing. The familiar presence that was always next to him at night, under the covers where no one would see, was gone. Desperately, he searched his mess of blankets until his brain woke up and the memory of the last night filtered in. His gut twisted with loss and he let his head slump forward into his pillow again. The slight rumble from the bowels of the ship told him they were out of dock and in motion. It also told him his last treasure was long gone now, uncaringly sucked out into the void of space. Heart breaking, he scrunched his face up against the threatening tears and balled his fists under his pillow, even as he chided himself for getting so worked up over a silly toy. He'd see things no one should ever see, done things that made him sick inside, and yet here he was crying because someone took away his stupid stuffed animal. But it was more than that, he admitted. Much more…

Frustrated, he scrubbed at his eyes with a fist. Dang it, he'd loved that mangy, stuffed cat, and it had been his! All his! The only thing he had that really was.

"Looking for something?"

His eyes snapped open to find his new boss standing in the doorway of the crew quarters, leaning against the bulkhead with her arms crossed. One hand clutched something brown and white and lumpish…

"'Vester!" he cried, pushing the covers off and reaching for the beloved toy at the same time, barely managing to keep from diving nose first off his top bunk in the process. He pulled it to his chest tightly, then blushed with embarrassment and looked away, trying to sit up taller. "But I thought you spaced him." he said quietly, confusion etched across his face. Then he noticed that his treasure was clean, and mended, and smelled good. His confusion turned to out-right astonishment, and he fingered the stuffed animal gently.

Beka sighed and sat down on the bunk opposite his. "Harper, why did you fix the slip drive?"

That wasn't the question he'd been expecting. "I uh…it was broken. I knew how to fix it." He said simply. "And I…kinda wanted to surprise you, do something nice for letting me stay."

Beka's guilt doubled. "Why didn't you tell me you'd done it?"

"I was gonna, but then you laid into me about Sylvester, and I was afraid you'd be even more mad at me. I didn't want to get yelled at again. Besides, I was kinda mad at you, too."

"That's what I thought," Beka replied. "Harper…Seamus… I owe you an apology. What I did yesterday, how I acted, that was just down right rotten and I'm sorry. I'm just…I'm not really good at this whole "good guy" stuff and well…" She trailed off.

"It's okay, Boss," Harper hurried to assure her, not really comfortable with this side of her or all this touchy-feely crap. "I know I can be annoying and drive people bonkers, just ask the Ubers…"

"No, Harper, it's not okay," Beka pressed, stashing that little comment about Nietzscheans away to be examined at a later time. "That stuffed toy…cat…_thing_ is obviously important to you, and I ignored that and told you to dump it just because I felt like it and I could. That's not right. I should have listened to you. And I shouldn't have been treating you in such a way this past month that you wouldn't dare tell me about something as important as fixing the slip drive! If we're gonna live on this ship together, be a crew, we need a higher level of trust than that. So, starting right here, right now, things will be different, okay? But the real question is, can you forgive me?"

"Can I keep 'Vester?" Harper returned, his eyes serious.

"Would I have washed the dumpy thing if I wasn't gonna let you?"

"Okay, deal. I forgive you."

"You forgive me? Just like that? How can you do that?" Beka asked in amazement.

Harper shrugged. "You're not the only one who's ever been awful to me, there's a long line ahead of you on that one. But you're the first that's ever apologized for it. So, even though you were pretty nasty, I figure it can only go up from here, right? Just don't do that to me again, please? Sylvester's all I got left!"

"I promise, the stuffed cat is safe," the captain assured him, holding her hands up in surrender. "And next time, just _tell_ me you know how to fix the slip drive instead of sneaking behind my back?"

"Deal." The boy jumped off the bunk after tucking his treasure under his pillow. His shirt and sweatpants were rumpled from sleep and his hair stood up like stalagmites. Beka noticed that one sock was flopping, half off his foot and the other was backwards, but Harper seemed oblivious. "So, got any breakfast?"

Beka laughed and stood up as well. "Sure. Wanna tell me the story behind Sylvester there while we cook?"

"Oh, that. Well, I always wanted a pet cat, but pets and Earth don't mix so well, so mom…"

THE END


End file.
